Chinese Mythology Atlas
The Ink Archive
Chinese mythology reference
This site organizes Chinese mythology by source and system: primordial creation, the Daoist heaven, the beasts of the Shan Hai Jing, the underworld, folk pantheons, Buddhist fusion, strange-tale fiction and festival legend. Follow a path, or look up a figure, a beast or a text directly.
Heaven, the Shan Hai Jing, and Diyu preserve three different strands of Chinese myth: celestial order, ancient sacred geography, and beliefs about the underworld. They come from different sources and later converged across Daoist traditions, early texts, popular religion, and literary narratives.
In folk and fictional stories the Jade Emperor is often the supreme commander of Heaven; within the Daoist pantheon he must still be separated from the Three Pure Ones, the Sovereigns, the Thunder Bureau and the star lodges. This site records divine status, office and fictional role in separate columns.
The Shan Hai Jing gathers mountains and rivers, lands beyond the seas, beasts, gods and sacrificial notes. This section follows its eighteen books across the Mountain, Sea and Great-Wilderness classics, then places the nine-tailed fox, the phoenix, Yinglong, Kui and the spinning turtle back at their original passages.
The underworld starts with the soul's path: death, escort, judgement, punishment, rebirth. Ten-Kings belief, Daoist underworld officials, city-god stories and fictional episodes are labeled side by side, never merged into one pretend-unified system.
For a fast route into the site, begin with the whole-domain guide to see how creation myths, Heaven, Shan Hai Jing, Diyu and folk pantheons are separated by source. Then move into the figure articles for identity, office, legends and source analysis.
Chinese mythology is not a simple family tree. Pangu, Nüwa, the Jade Emperor, the Four Dragon Kings and the Ten Kings of Hell can all appear on one whole-domain map, but their sources must be separated first: creation myth, celestial office, Shan Hai beasts, four-sea water courts, underworld officials or vernacular fiction.
The Jade Emperor, often called Yudi or Tiangong, is the most visible supreme administrative ruler in Heaven narratives. The article separates his honorific titles, divine rank, relation to the Four or Six Sovereigns, cultivation legends, Tiangong worship, novel portrayals and common misunderstandings.
The same divine name may appear in classical texts, Daoist pantheons, folk belief, fiction and modern adaptation. This site marks the source layer first, then explains identity, office, story and relations so different versions are not merged into one vague answer.
Texts such as the Shan Hai Jing, Huainanzi, Soushen Ji and Taiping Guangji are recorded with chapter, keywords and context. When a passage can be located, the site does not simply say "an old book records it."
Journey to the West and Investiture of the Gods are treated as fiction layers. They matter greatly, but they cannot replace earlier myths or religious systems.
Daoist deities, Ten Kings belief, City God worship and local legends are kept in context whenever possible. Regional differences are not rewritten as one nationwide version.
Games, animation, film and television enter only the modern-adaptation layer for comparison, not as primary sources. Their value is to show how images change, not to overwrite earlier sources.
Whole-domain themes
Heaven, the Shan Hai Jing and Diyu are the three main lines; beyond them, Chinese mythology also holds folk functional gods, Buddhist fusion, strange-tale notebooks, vernacular novels, festival legends and modern adaptation. Use this map to decide whether to read folk gods, the strange-tale system, novel characters or festival legends next.
Read the long guide: Chinese Mythology, a Whole-Domain Tour